Great comparison on PezCyclingNews that demonstrates the differences (or lack thereof) between Floyd’s training rides and his epic Stage 17 performance in the Tour de France.
Training Ride:
Duration: 6:04 (hrs:min)
Distance: 115 miles
Average Speed: 19.0 mph
Perception of Effort (1-10): 7
Average Power: 247 Watts
Total Work from Power: 5394 Kjoules
Peak Power for 1 min: 545 watts
Peak Power for 5 min: 470 watts
Peak Power for 30 min: 391 watts
Peak Power for 1 hour: 377 watts
Peak Power for 2 hours: 372 watts
Here’s Floyd’s data from Stage 17 (source: Allen Lim, Bicycling.com):
– 5 hours 23 minutes and 36 seconds.
– Covering 200.5 kilometers (130 km alone in the wind).
– At a speed of 37.175 km/hr.
– Averaging 281 watts when moving for the whole ride and 318 watts over the last two hours.
– Averaging 324 watts while pedaling for the whole ride and 364 watts over the last 2 hours.
– At an average cadence of 89 rpm.
– 5456 kj
– Attacking about a quarter of the way up the Col des Saisies for 30 seconds at 544 watts, which settled into a 5-minute peak of 451 watts, which continued for 10 minutes at an average of power of 431 watts, and left everyone in his dust after 30 minutes at an average power of 401 watts.
– Spending 13.2% of his time or 43 minutes coasting like a rocket on the descents and another 60% between 4 to 7 watts per kilogram of body weight (aka, the pain cave).
– Holding onto 373 watts over the Col de Joux-Plane.
Landis won several prestigious races this year, including the Tour of California and Paris-Nice. He passed all of the doping controls then. It doesn’t add up that he would pass all the tests up to and after Stage 17.
I used to be a Tyler Hamilton apologist (after all, he swore on his dead dog’s grave!), but after looking at the faxes between his wife and Dr. Fuentes, I’m more skeptical. With Landis, I’m still on his bandwagon. Occam’s Razor, in my mind, doesn’t apply here even if the B sample confirms the A sample. Elevated T/E ratios doesn’t imply doping; it is what it says, and those ratios can be explained by other means than doping.
tow.com 